The sweeping epic of Mars's fight for freedom-an unforgettable saga of war, family, and civilization on the red frontier.
For generations, the Newcastles, Mackenzies, Atkinses, Hyltons, and Hollinses have endured the hard red soil of Mars-and survived by individual grit, intense family loyalty, and free market trade. Scarred by World War III and Earth's long, violent aftermath, they built farms, raised domes, forged alliances, and carried old grudges to a new world. Together, the Martians have forged a frontier society that is complex, ornery, and rooted in the freedom of the Texas soil from which many of the clans sprang. Trade with the nearby Chinese enclaves brought prosperity for a time. But Beijing's reach lengthens. Trade becomes tribute. Tribute becomes force.
When Chinese armored columns grind across Karl's Ramp and convoys are torn apart in the Chaos, Mars is plunged into war. Robinson City's dome falls in fire and blood. The Burrows holds out under siege until supply convoys break through beneath burning skies. At Lowell and Meltwater, shields collapse, the ground turns molten, and the plains are seared by energy fire.
The clans face an empire pressing down from above and rivalries tearing them apart from within. Senators brawl in council halls, mobs surge through the streets, and old feuds erupt-even on the football field. Out of devastation, a fragile coalition is born: uneasy, volatile, but fierce enough to strike back. Freightliners become fortresses. Drones become weapons. Family honor hardens into resistance.
From isolated domes to the vast Martian plains to the black sky above, war sparks into revolution and desperate struggle to form an alliance, then a country, and ultimately to forge a nation on the red soil of a distant planet men now call home.
A vast chronicle of clans and civilizations, of families too proud to yield, too divided to trust, and too determined to be ruled. It is the saga of a frontier world where rival dynasties, imperial power, and the red soil itself shape the destiny of humanity itself.
